


Trouble is My Pleasure

by misura



Category: Quadrail Series - Timothy Zahn
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-22 05:05:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16591373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: And also my business, except when it turns out it's not, except that it is. (It's complicated.)





	Trouble is My Pleasure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jaclynhyde](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaclynhyde/gifts).



> happy Yuletide, jaclynhyde!

Having just saved the universe (again, I might add), I felt that I deserved a bit of R&R, which was to say that I spent an evening drinking more than was strictly wise and a night in the company of an adventurous and, as it turned out, fairly flexible Nemut.

I woke up the next morning feeling rather pleased with myself. True, the Modhri was still out there, but for the moment at least, his plans had been foiled once again by yours truly and friends, and so all was well.

My Nemuti friend was still asleep, which suited me just fine. I'd simply collect my clothes and leave, and if a small part of me thought that perhaps it might be worth sticking around and perhaps even extending a dinner invitation, the bigger, sensible part of me knew what a bad idea that would be.

I got dressed quickly and quietly, scanning the room for anything I might have missed. One thing to slip out after a one-night stand with a stranger you were probably never going to see again; another to have to come back because you'd left your keys on his kitchen table or the like.

Everything accounted for, I headed for the door. This, of course, was the moment the Nemut woke up.

"Compton."

I felt as if all the blood in my veins had turned to ice. We'd exchanged names the night before, sure enough, but I was damn sure I hadn't actually been so foolish as to give my real one. Why bother, after all, when I had no intention of prolonging our acquaintance?

Which meant that this Nemut was, in fact, a Modhran walker.

I turned, hoping none of my emotions showed on my face. "Modhri. Good morning."

"Is it?" he asked, rather ominously.

"It is to me," I assured him. In truth, I was frantically trying to recall if any of my slightly hazy memories from the night before involved being scratched and possibly infected.

"Why?" he asked. "What are you up to, Compton?"

"Me?" I didn't even have to pretend innocence. That didn't mean I was at all confident of convincing him. "What makes you think I'm up to anything?" On the other hand, I reassured myself, if the Modhri suspected my sleeping with one of his Eyes had been deliberate, it couldn't have been part of any plan he'd hatched himself.

Of course, that might be exactly what he wanted me to think.

"You are always up to something, Compton," the Modhri stated flatly.

"Well, all right. I guess you got me." I spread my hands. "Congratulations. Can I go now?"

"Explain your plan to me," the Modhri demanded.

Either he was an excellent actor, or I had been far luckier than I deserved. I reached for the doorplate, hoping my host hadn't thought to lock it. "Sorry. That's not how the game works."

The door slid open and I left, considerably less cheerful and more humble than I'd been when I arrived.

 

During the next few weeks, I went over my memory of that night and my conversation with the Modhri again and again. I also spent each day checking for black-outs, gaps in my memory, however small, anything that might point towards the Modhri having managed to turn me.

In the end, though, I managed to convince myself that nothing had happened - at least, nothing that involved the Modhri. I had let my guard down, and now I'd learned my lesson. Time to move on.

I should have known it wasn't going to be as simple as that.

 

A Bellido this time, whom I'd impressed with retellings of one of my favorite dit rec shows as adventures I'd lived through myself. Needless to say, he wasn't fooled, but since I knew he wasn't, that didn't stop us from spending a pleasant enough evening.

The night wasn't half-bad either, once we'd worked out the logistics.

The morning, naturally, was when it all went to hell.

"I still cannot conceive of your plan."

Bad luck, or was this all part of some devious ploy? "Good," I said. "Keep trying. I'm sure you'll get there eventually."

"I'm beginning to think that perhaps you do not have one. Perhaps you are simply fishing."

'Playing with fire' would be more like it. "For what? Information? Do you think I'm an idiot?"

"Foolish, perhaps, in opposing me, but never an idiot," the Modhri said. "An honorable opponent. Is that not the human term?"

If only I might return the feeling. Unfortunately, I knew all too well the Modhri was far from honorable. Which meant, unlikely as it sounded, that I couldn't dismiss the possibility that he'd somehow nudged his Eyes in my direction for some reason or another.

The 64 million credits question being why. What was the Modhri up to? "Am I expected to feel flattered?"

"Few have thwarted my plans as effectively as you," the Modhri said. "Why not take pride in your accomplishments?"

"Quit while I'm ahead, you mean?" I chuckled. "Nice try."

"It seems a sensible enough choice," the Modhri said. "This is not your fight, Compton. Why continue to risk your life? I have told you before, I do not hold grudges. Withdraw, and I will leave you in peace. Continue on this path you have chosen, and sooner or later, I will kill you."

"Perhaps. Perhaps not. I guess we'll have to wait and see, won't we?"

The Modhri sighed. "As I said, you are foolish."

I couldn't help myself: I leaned forwards and kissed him, thereby quite likely proving him right.

Still, the expression on his face was everything I could have hoped for, and then some.

"You know, it takes two to tango," I said, wondering what on earth had possessed me. "If you're so concerned about my safety, why not hold off on plotting to take over the galaxy for a while?"

The Modhri stared at me, wide-eyed. He had to have experienced intimacy through his walkers before, but it was one thing to experience something as a passenger, and quite another to be there as an active participant.

I wished I had some clever, penetrating question to ask. In the state he appeared to be in now, he might actually have answered it.

"Think about that for a while, why don't you?"

With that parting shot, I left.

 

Outward appearances notwithstanding, I was beginning to get worried. Once might be a coincidence, twice was pushing it. Did I really want to risk it happening a third time?

Could I afford not to? True, I'd never exactly been a social butterfly. It was what had made me such an ideal employee for the Spiders, someone far less likely to fall prey to one of the Modhri's thought viruses.

And the fact was, what went for me, had to go for the Modhri as well. He, too, had put himself in a compromising position. Twice. Granted, given the number of people walking around with one of his polyp colonies in them, it might simply be a matter of statistics, but the Modhri himself didn't seem to think so. He thought it was all part of a plan - my plan, to be precise.

Perhaps it wouldn't be such a bad thing to let him continue to think so. After all, if he was busy trying to figure out what I was up to, that meant he _wasn't_ busy doing something far more nefarious.

... Or so I might rationalize my choice to myself if he'd gotten to me after all.

In which case, I figured I might as well enjoy what little time I had left as my own person.

 

"Compton."

Well. That was quick. "You're early." I tried not to sound resentful. We hadn't even left the bar yet.

"Why are you doing this?" the Modhri asked. "What is it you hope to gain?"

Replying that I'd hoped to gain proof that my ability to pick up a likely, non-walker one-night stand hadn't gone completely on the fritz seemed unlikely to give me the upper hand in this conversation.

"Isn't it obvious?" I replied instead, trying to sound like a teacher who's a little disappointed in a particularly slow student.

"You must know the biological processes you pursue have no effect whatsoever on my ability to control my Eyes. Nor do they affect myself in any way," the Modhri added, a little too quickly. "So, no. It is not obvious. Explain it to me."

"I told you that's not how the game is played." I wagged a finger at him.

"There is no game," the Modhri said. "Is there?"

"You haven't tried to kill me recently," I said.

He shrugged. "You haven't interfered with any of my plans recently. I told you, I don't hold grudges. I have more important things to do than take revenge on people who have proven a mild nuisance."

"Insulting your prospective date generally is considered a bad idea."

"Then pick someone else," the Modhri said immediately, as if he'd been waiting for the chance. Perhaps he had been. I discovered the idea stung, just a bit. I liked to think that none of my previous one-night stands had been left with any reason to complain - other than, perhaps, my abrupt departure on the morning after, but there was nothing I could do about that. "Surely there is another here who might draw your eye."

"Why?" I asked, genuinely curious. I knew why _I_ might want to change partners, only what reason could the Modhri have for not wanting me to go home with one of his Eyes?

"Why not?" the Modhri countered. "Unless," he added slyly, "you really are up to something."

"Sorry, but you're going to have to do better than that. I'm happy with the date I've got. I'm not going to go through the trouble of introducing myself to someone else simply at your say-so."

The Modhri considered. I guessed he could afford to. Drunk people forgot things, after all, so if his walker woke up tomorrow with a few gaps in his memory, he was unlikely to think about it twice.

"So what you're saying is, you are happy with _me_ as your date?" he said at last.

"I wouldn't put it quite like that." If only because it made me sound more than a little insane. The Modhri was my enemy, after all. He might not consider having tried to kill me several times anything personal, but I had a somewhat different view on the matter.

Plus, there was the whole part where he wanted to take over the universe.

"Then how would you put it?" the Modhri asked.

"Leave, and I might tell you tomorrow morning," I suggested.

He rose. "I am ready to go when you are."

I sighed. "That's not what I meant and you know it."

"I have extensively analyzed the sensation of being kissed by you, and it is my conclusion that it is something easily recreated," the Modhri said. "It should not require any specific Human."

His body language made it rather clear that he was lying. I wasn't sure what to do with that. "It's always good to know what you need."

The Modhri reached for me, completely catching me off-guard. Lucky for me, he was after nothing more serious than a kiss, albeit a rather clumsy one on his part.

Still, it seemed rude to complain now that he seemed to have dropped the whole idea of me needing to find someone else to spend a few pleasant hours with.

 

I couldn't be sure, but I rather suspected the Modhri stayed in control during everything that followed, which meant I'd best set my alarm early, to prevent an extra awkward morning-after.

Of course, the Modhri still noticed me leaving.

"I hope you know this doesn't change anything," I told him. "Next time you try something, I'm still going to do everything I can to stop you."

"I would expect nothing less," the Modhri said. "And I, in turn, will do what I may to kill you."

"Glad we're clear about that." For the moment, I trusted him enough to turn my back on him.

"Compton," he said, before I reached the door.

I didn't turn. "Yes, Modhri?"

He hesitated. "Nothing. Until we meet again."

"Count on it," I said, and left, trying to tell myself I didn't care at all whether the next time we met it would be as enemies.

I hadn't lied when I'd assured him I had every intention of stopping him again next time, but given the choice, I had to admit I liked the idea of us meeting again as friends far better.

Still, as I'd told him once, it took two to tango. I'd just have to wait and see if the Modhri wanted to dance.


End file.
